1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a server system including a server apparatus and at least one terminal apparatus electrically connected thereto through transmission lines.
2. Description of the Related Art
A server apparatus included in a conventional server system stores data and application programs shared by numerous terminal apparatus users. The server apparatus is connected to terminal apparatuses through a network such as a LAN. Each terminal apparatus includes: an image display device such as a CRT, a liquid crystal panel or the like; various input devices such as a keyboard and the like; and various functional devices such as a CPU (central processing unit), a system memory, a video controller, a hard disk, etc. That is, each terminal apparatus forms an independent computer system which can operate an operating system for managing the entire terminal apparatus.
Each terminal apparatus of the conventional server system is expensive since the terminal apparatus forms an independent computer system. Accordingly, a large investment is necessary for increasing the number of terminal apparatuses.
In recent years, functions of functional devices such as a CPU, a video controller and the like have been rapidly improving, and accordingly, required resources and the amount of data to be processed for each application program have increased. Thus, it is ideal to enhance the performance of an entire server system. However, it is a significant economic burden to upgrade or newly purchase all of the numerous terminal apparatuses. Thus, in many server systems, there are many old type terminal apparatuses with inferior performance that have not been upgraded or substituted.
A large amount of electric power is consumed in the case when using a computer system having numerous functional devices as a terminal apparatus.
Furthermore, when an application program is commonly used by a plurality of terminal apparatuses (for example, when a plurality of users take part in an interactive game over a network or when a television conference is held over a network), the application program needs to be executed on each terminal apparatus. In such a case, resources are wasted.
Further still, since it is difficult to share information in real time among a plurality of computers connected through a LAN or the like, performance of an application program is greatly restricted.